This invention relates to a network geo-location system, and more particularly to a method for identifying the geographic location of a computing device that is effecting a transaction with another computing device on a network such as the Internet.
For many network transactions it is unimportant where the parties are located, except for shipping and billing purposes. But there are situations where a party's location may be central to the entire transaction. For example, a seller offering bargain rates might desire to target potential customers in only a particular city or state, and in such a case it may be necessary to verify that a customer is indeed in the locality where he claims to be. Another example is that of a service that provides movies for viewing, with the content providers desiring to limit movie distribution to the United States only.
Every client on a network has an address, an IP address in the case of the Internet. There are services, such as those offered by the Quova Geopoint, the Digital Envoy Geo-lntelligence and the Digital Island TraceWare services, which provide the geographic location of a machine having a specific IP address. A service provider can thus check a customer's geographic location if it knows the customer's IP address. However, it is known that checking an IP address against a geographic database this way is imperfect for a number of reasons.
For several reasons, determining geographic locations from IP addresses may be incorrect and unreliable. Some of the reasons include: First, there is no assurance that when an IP address is assigned, the assignee will have provided accurate geographic data such as street, city, zip-code, and time-zone. Thus the geographic database consulted may not have the correct information. Second, a portable PC configured with a fixed (a non-Network Address Translation (NAT) or non-Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP)) IP address, especially a laptop, can easily be taken to another locality and even out of the country. Third, routers can be configured to replace the client local address with a geographically acceptable address during transmission.
Another problem is that some Internet transactions involve the IP address of a proxy server rather than a client's IP address. For example, if an America Online “AOL”) subscriber has a network connection through a cable modem, DSL or an office network, this subscriber uses the IP address issued from the cable, DSL or office system to connect to the internet. But AOL's client application assigns to the subscriber a proxy address when using AOL. A service organization, such as Quova Geopoint, Digital Envoy Geo-lntelligence, or Digital Island TraceWare, that checks the geographic location of an AOL subscriber in the United States by looking at the IP address being used will likely determine that the subscriber has an address in Reston, Va., where AOL is located, rather than the true geographic address of the subscriber. This is because all of the AOL proxy IP addresses have a physical address of Reston, Va.
It is an object of our invention to provide a method for accurately determining the geographic location of a network user, a process that we call “Geo-Location.”
It is another object of our invention to provide such a geo-location method that is less susceptible to tampering than methods that simply look up the location of a client PC IP address.
It is another object of our invention to prevent geographic IP spoofing by placement of a network device with a forged or stolen IP address between a client machine and the Internet.